Did you know that Leonardo DiCaprio once turned down American Psycho and these other films?

Leonardo DiCaprio is an actor who needs no introduction. He has been in the industry for over three decades, and worked with the likes of Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Baz Luhrmann and Alejandro González Iñárritu, cementing his status as one of the very best actors of his generation.

Although his performance as Jack in James Cameron’s Titanic has been his most popular and enduring, DiCaprio has consistently delivered great performances in a range of films, including Romeo + Juliet, The Aviator, The Wolf of Wall Street and Once Upon a Time in…Hollywood.

Along the way Leonardo has also rejected a lot of roles he was offered, that could have become very different films in his presence. Did you know that Bernardo Bertolucci first offered the role of Matthew in The Dreamers to him? He declined the offer because he was already committed to The Aviator by then. The role went to Michael Pitt, who surprisingly looks a lot like a younger Leonardo.

The actor also famously turned down the role of Patrick Bateman in American Psycho after negative reactions to the role, which predicted that playing such a controversial character would be no less than a career suicide. Eventually it was Christian Bale who took on the role and the rest is history. Even George Lucas considered Leonardo DiCaprio for the role of Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars: Episode II – Attack Of The Clones, but the actor turned down the offer saying that he wasn’t ready for the part. Later actor Hayden Christensen stepped into the role.

The Academy Award winning actor will be next seen in Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, which is set to release in 2023.